To better evaluate and diagnose faults and problems in the network, a signaling tracing (Trace) technology has been put forward in the prior art. That is, a network element management system (EMS, Equipment Management System) sends parameter configurations for the signaling tracing to network element nodes, and then receives signaling tracing data returned by the network element nodes, and locates faults and problems in the network by analyzing the signaling tracing data. Further, to reduce operation costs and enhance automation functions of the network, another signaling tracing solution has been put forward based on the traditional signaling tracing method. In this signaling tracing solution, a user equipment (UE, User Equipment) is used to report parameters required for network optimization automatically. For example, in a Long Term Evolution (LTE, Long Term Evolution) project, it is called minimization of drive test (MDT, Minimization of Drive Test). In such a solution, when a network problem occurs, for example, when the user equipment fails to access a random access channel (RACH, Random Access Channel), enters a coverage hole, or encounters a network capacity problem, the user equipment records relevant network parameters automatically no matter whether the user equipment is online or offline, and reports the network parameters to a network device according to a reporting cycle configured by the network. Therefore, the network device can analyze current problems of the network device according to the network parameters reported by the user equipment, and perform the network optimization accordingly.
Currently, there are two signaling tracing configuration modes: one is a management-based signaling tracing configuration mode, and the other is a signaling-based signaling tracing configuration mode.
In the existing network architecture, a scenario that an access network and a core network may be managed by different operation administration and maintenance (OAM, Operation Administration and Maintenance) devices exists. As shown in FIG. 1a, in such a scenario, the OAM device of the access network is unable to initiate a signaling-based signaling tracing configuration mode for a specific user, but can only initiate a management-based signaling tracing configuration mode.